Post subject: Re: Top engines without tablebases don't play as good as top Posted: Sat Mar 24, 2012 4:48 pm

pichy wrote:

jdart wrote:

Endgame play can involve very long-range planning, and computers are still not terribly good at that.

On the other hand, many games, including those at GM level, are decided by mistakes that no modern engine would make.

And many times pre-computer GM analysis of endgames is faulty or incomplete.

--Jon

I agree that many non top GMs make mistakes, but I would put my money on GM Aronian or Kramnik against any of the top 5 engines without Nalimov or any other tablebases to play 6 ending positions in 10 minutes per move.

There is no question the top programs are far superior to even the best humans in the overall game and ELO.

Databases make very little difference in the strength of the programs. At best perhaps a tiny boost, but there is a school of thought that they play worse with databases too due to overheads and such.

There are area's of course where each is far superior, for example closed positions are difficult for computers. But from the standpoint of a 10 game match for instance without databases of any kind a Rybka class program will have an easy match victory against the very best the human race has to offer._________________Capital punishment would be more effective as a preventive measure if it were administered prior to the crime.